Mexican police report shows thousands of guns lost over decade

Insight

Mexican police report shows thousands of guns lost over decade

Mexico’s National Institute of Transparency just issued a disturbing report – it shows thousands of weapons have been lost or stolen from Mexico’s law enforcement agencies in the past decade.

CCTV’s Martin Markovits has insight into the problem. Follow Martin Markovits on Twitter @MartinMarkovits

Criminal organizations in Mexico wanting to beef up their cache of weapons need not look any further than their country’s own security forces.

It used to be that criminal groups in Mexico got most of their black market weapons from the U.S. But as security along the U.S. border has improved, Mexico has become its own best supplier.

The Mexican government said more than 2,000 guns disappeared in 2009, a record number in the country. According to Mexico’s National institute of Transparency, some 800 guns were either lost or stolen from local police stations in Mexico City. Officials point to widespread corruption among Mexican authorities.

Meanwhile, Mexico’s legal import of guns increased by more than 330 percent between the period of 2010 and 2015.

However, the proliferation of weapons from within Mexico indicates that not all illegal arms come from the U.S. In fact, there are reports that some cartels could even be manufacturing their own weapons.

The Mexican military has steadily increased arms purchases to fight the drug war raging in the country. Some fear this will provide criminal gangs even a bigger arsenal from which to steal making the problem worse in the coming years.


Laura Carlsen discusses Mexico’s missing guns crisis

For more about what U.S. could do to stop the flow of guns into Mexico and the crisis of Mexico’s missing guns, CCTV America’s Mike Walter spoke to Laura Carlsen, director of the Americas Program at the Center for International Policy. She’s also a columnist for Foreign Policy In Focus.